NEWS UNBRANDED!

54 states, and 16 other resolutions of the Confab that will change Nigeria forever

The report of the National Conference has recommended many things that may change the political, social and economic fortunes of Nigerians in the short to long term.

This report gives a glimpse into the recommendations as made by the report.

According to Vanguard, some of the recommendations are

Creation of 18 additional states;

adoption of modified presidential system of government that integrates the parliamentary and presidential systems;

part-time bi-cameral legislature at all levels;

re-introduction of the old National Anthem; removal of immunity clause for criminal offences; independent candidacy and abrogation of the local government as a tier of government; scrapping of State Independent Electoral Commissions, SIECs stoppage of government sponsorships of Christian and Muslim pilgrimages to holy lands.

Sharing of funds to the Federation Account among the three tiers of government should be: Federal Government (42.5 per cent), State governments (35 per cent) and Local governments (22.5 per cent);

in the modified presidential system the president shall pick the vice president from the Legislature and select not more than 18 ministers from the six geo-political zones and not more than 30 per cent of his ministers from outside the Legislature;

President should reduce cost of governance by pruning the number of political appointees and using staff of ministries where necessary; presidential power should rotate between the North and the South and among the six geo-political zones, while the governorship will rotate among the three senatorial districts in a state.

With local governments no longer the third tier of government, the federal and states are now the only tiers of government, states can now create as many local governments as they want. The Joint State/Local Government Account be scrapped and in its place the establishment of a State RMAFC with representatives of LG and a chairman nominated by the Governor.

The Constitution should fix the tenure for Local Government Councils at three years.

Special courts should handle corruption cases in view of undue prolonged trials and prosecution of corruption cases in the regular courts; retention of Land Tenure in the Constitution but with an amendment to take care of concerns, particularly compensation in Section 29 (4) of the Act to read “land owners should determine the price and value of their land based on open market value.